Raising The Costa Concordia

The Costa Concordia is known as the largest salvage job to date. At 290 meters long and 13 decks high it was no small task. The first step of this process was to right the ship. Using Ardent's (TITAN Salvage) vast experience we were able to undertake this process. Due to the proximity to the rocky shore we were very limited in maneuverability of our equipment. The first phase was how to stabilize her since we did not know the extent of damage to the hull or if it would hold up. To prepare we built three large subsea platforms (1,000 tons) and two smaller platforms to stabilize the vessel after righting. For the platforms to be secure we had to drill 25, 2 diameter sockets into the seabed. In order to secure the bow we built blister tanks (4-5 stories tall), they were sunken into place and fitted like a brace. Sponsons were installed on the port side in order to create a better setup for stabilization during parbuckling. The parbuckling force (6,800 tons) provided by 32 strandjacks, were mounted on the sponsons and pulled on the three largest platforms. In order to right the vessel we needed to move it 65 degrees, with careful planning we achieved a rotation of 3.6 degrees per hour for 19 hours. When the vessel reached about 35 degrees the sponsons were flooded and gravity helped with the roll. After completing the righting, the ship was secured to the platforms for winter.